


A Singular Unfortunate Event

by jackassery



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, PEN, Tagged for the tragic and graphic death of a seed, Vampires, Werewolf Attack (mentioned), enjoy this festering bullshit, ir was prompted by an amazing thing drawn by my friend, marriage counsel sam winchestnut, mentions of macadamia nut, physical assault, please read this, with trenchcoat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-07
Updated: 2017-02-07
Packaged: 2018-09-22 14:42:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9612005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jackassery/pseuds/jackassery
Summary: Dean's off on a hunting trip with his brother Sam. When, after a few days, they don't return; Castiel takes the initiative and discovers a shocking artifact within Dean's bedroom.





	

   "Now, don't forgive me if I'm wrong, Sammy, because I'm never wrong- I _really_ don't think beheading some poor disaster of a man's long-thought-dead grandmother while they both reconciled over freshly baked macadamia nut cookies was in the job description."  
   "Don't be an idiot, Dean. Vampires are capable of faking their death for 20 years while they perfect their Grandma's Cookies recipe somewhere in Alaska, too."  
   An unneeded gun Dean was carrying dropped into the trunk with a loud clatter as he slung it down. "Yeah, whatever man."  
   Sam looked over at his brother, who now held his palm atop the Impala's open trunk.  
   The night was silent before Dean spoke up again, refusing to close the trunk until he had an explanation for Sam's oddly accusatory glancing. "What? What's that look you're giving me for?"  
   "What look?"  
   "That one, that one right now," Dean insisted, rolling his eyes and finally pushing down the trunk to close it so that he had a free hand to gesture vaguely at Sam's face.  
   "Oh, you mean this one?" he said with mock understanding, his features unchanging. "Dude, that's just my face. That's how it is."  
   Dean shook his head and turned away- in one hand, he held a bag containing a box of chicken tenders and fries that they acquired at the last gas station they'd visited. The other hand now held the key-card to the room the both of them were staying in at the hotel they were parked in front of. The job with the 'vampire grandma' happened to be no more than a side quest from a different hunt in the area that had no new leads to go on. It consisted of a single kill with werewolf-consistent traits. Rather boring.  
   Dean put the bag of food on the counter, with Sam following behind him into the room. He pulled a chicken tender from the box, and nearly bit into it before Sam flashed another one of his _looks_ at him.  
   "Okay, what now? You're interrupting my intimate moment, here," Dean snapped, crumbs of breading falling to the floor which earned him a few grumblings of distaste from Sam.  
   Sam sat on a chair across the room, picking up his phone and pointedly scrolling through several missed calls from Castiel to show his brother. "You've been missing these all evening, he was calling you like crazy. He started calling me instead around three hours ago, and I can see now why you had your phone on silent the whole time."  
   "He was calling me? Well damn, Sammy, you could have said something instead of giving me the bitch face every five minutes. I can't read minds, y'know." Dean put down his chicken tender, still uneaten, and fished his phone from his pocket with greasy hands.  
   There were 73 calls from 'Cass' that he'd missed during his trip. He hovered his thumb over the call button, figuring that he should at least give the guy the closure of returning his bajillion calls. He furrowed his brow at the screen, however, and a tense moment later, he clicked elsewhere.  
   Sam was staring him down from his shitty, creaky hotel chair on the opposite side of the room. "Well? You're not going to try and patch up your clearly-failing marriage?"  
   "Shut your face, Sam. This is buggin' me, give me a sec. I've gotta fix it," Dean uttered under his breath, decidedly clicking the backspace button once on his friend's contact name. "That's better, now I can call him back without feeling like a complete and total oompaloompa."  
   Sam gawked at Dean as he finally brought the phone to his ear. "Oompaloompa? Dean, do you need some sort of, uh... Help?" he asked, making a swirling gesture at the side of his head with his hand only to be shushed by the man in question.  
   Dean drew in a breath as Castiel picked up the phone, but he wasn't fast enough to get a word in before the other went on a winding tangent.  
   "Dean, where were you? I tried to call you at least seventy times, I think a few more than that; hang on, let me check," came the familiar, raspy voice.  
   Dean opened his mouth to talk, and was silenced by more of his beating around some holy bush.  
   "Seventy-three, I called you seventy-three times and you didn't answer. I was worried, you said you and Sam were on a hunt, and since it's been longer than usual I got a bit concerned. Forgive the intrusion, but I had to take matters into my own hands with this one, but it seems as if my worries were unfounded..."  
   "Would you shut your gaping windpipe for just one-"  
   "...Though, in my efforts to find out what could have happened, something else terrible and baffling has occurred..."  
   "Cas, what are you even on about?"  
   "I found something mildly alarming, Dean, I need answers immediately. It could be dangerous."  
   "Alright, whatever you say. Where're you at, I'll-"  
He heard the staticky beep of Castiel hanging up, while a simultaneous knocking came from the door.  
   "Did he seriously stand outside during that whole call?" Sam piped in after a while of sitting and looking on amusedly.  
   "Guess so," Dean replied, pursing his lips and swiftly opening the door.  
   Castiel stood, out of breath, at the doorway. He glanced to both sides of the hall and walked in before either Sam or Dean could say anything.  
   Peering outside skeptically, Dean turned his attention to Castiel. "Uh, so- your car's broke down, ain't it?"  
   "I ran," came the simple response from the angel. He paced around the room, which seemed to be more cramped with 3 adults now in it.  
   Dean nodded slowly, his face contorted in a peculiar expression. "So... What's all this about, anyway? What's really so important if you're not standing with your arms hanging by their tendons?"  
   He received a withering glare, but Castiel quickly stepped towards Dean and put his hand in an inner pocket of his coat.  
   "I found this thing," he began, now holding an item that was currently obscured from Sam and Dean's sight, "on top of your bed earlier. I think it's a sign, something left there to warn you... Dean, I don't think an item like this one can get on your bed through normal means. It was placed intentionally."  
   Dean leaned in towards him, trying to get a better look at whatever it was that the angel held. "What?"  
   Castiel lifted the object gingerly between his index finger and thumb, observing it in the light. "This. A pinecone. It has to symbolize something, I'm sure of it, there's no other explanation-"  
   "Why are you pulling my leg? That's the corn cob I ate the other Friday, surely you remember. Was only a few days back. I wonder how it got there, though- hey, there's still some left! Haha, score. Gimme that."  
   Castiel stared at Dean, holding it away from him. "...You're not making any sense. You have this face, this look," he murmured, inching closer to try and understand his expression. "You're... hungry," he said resolutely.  
   "Well, yeah, I'm hungry, so gimme that corn. It'll go great with my chicken tenders, if I ever get a chance to put them in my mouth."  
   "You have the hungry face... but you're looking at a pinecone...?"  
   "It's a fuckin' corn on the cob, and it looks delicious. That joint we got it from always had the best corn, right Sammy?"  
   From across the room, an enthused Sam agreed with false conviction.  
   Castiel cleared his throat. "If you're going to try and eat it, I can't give you this pinecone, Dean. It's for your own good; we have to try and decode the meaning of it!"  
   "Come on, _Cassy-boo_. You didn't need to go all that way to bring me the leftovers from Friday's takeout, but you did, so hand it here. It's mine to begin with."

 Castiel stiffened, and behind him, Sam shuddered with suppressed laughter. 'Cassy-boo' was a terrible nickname that never caught on and was only used when Dean wanted something from him- it was a joke, something to bring the stubborn angel down a notch. He'd picked up the nickname while on a rare job with the brothers, and a young girl had called him Cassy-boo after he admitted his background to the child because of the nature of the case. The girl claimed to hear the voices of angels, but it turned out to be the typical schizophrenic. Sam and Dean had called him 'Cassy-boo' for the majority of the rest of the day, with Dean keeping up the gag a little longer after Sam stopped. It did well to make him regret whatever it was he was doing at the moment.  
   And, at that moment, Castiel was suddenly regretting his withholding of a pinecone from a Dean Winchester. He almost gave in, his eyes darting between the pinecone and Dean's anticipatory gaze.  
   "C'mon. Hand it here."  
   "...No. It's mine- I mean, it's for me to hold on to if you're going to try and eat it. Why not eat your chicken?" he said slowly, pointing to the uneaten chicken tenders on the counter.  
   "Because, they aren't as good knowing that I could also be eating corn with them. Come on, my arms are getting tired, give it," Dean demanded.  
   "No," Castiel repeated firmly, though his own arm was beginning to tire. An angel without grace was as useful as a human being without supernatural enhancement; seeing as that's exactly what he was. He frowned. It was an uphill battle, but he wouldn't give up. He simply could not have Dean eating the evidence of a break-in, and also the only lead they had on what the symbolism meant.  
   Dean huffed and swatted at his hand, reaching for the pinecone. Castiel had to stand on his toes to keep it out of the other's reach, but doing so led to his loss of balance.  
   The pinecone dropped with the almost sickening sound of rough bristles scraping the wooden floor.  
   Dean gaped at the dropped item as if it were a highly awaited entrée gone to waste. "Cas! Look what you've done!"  
   "I dropped it," he observed helpfully. His eyes watered at the realization that this was no longer the Dean he knew. It was the shadow of a man, once great, bent and torn from a hunger so terrifyingly sharp that it resounded to the essence of the very emotions he's been trying to understand since he lost his grace. He said it again, a foreign feeling slipping unexpectedly into his voice as he looked down at the pinecone: "...I dropped it."  
   Dean stared at him, slowly putting his hand in his jacket pocket, stepping closer to him than he'd ever let the other wander to himself.  
   "Dean, what are you doing?" he said with a tiny, pitiable sniffle. The sentiment felt gross and demeaning. He earned no response from Dean, who now took his hand out of his pocket, holding something and fidgeting with it habitually. He didn't seem to notice that he held it.  
   "...Sweetie-pie?" Castiel tried, taking a step back. Perhaps a retaliation against his tasteless nickname would snap him back to his senses.  
   Dean took another step towards him, crunching the pinecone beneath his boot. "You dropped that corn, Cas. I can't believe it."  
   Sam held his breath in the background, sitting at the edge of his chair as if he was watching his favorite reality TV show.  
   Dean jabbed his hand towards Castiel's chest, shoving his thumb into the folds of his shirt in furious blame.  
   Castiel jumped slightly at the contact of the metal pen he held which had lodged itself between his shirt and his coat. Dean tried to pull his thumb away from his chest, but alas, the pen continued to be stuck.  
   Sam, ever the resourceful one, stood and used his pocket knife to cut away Castiel's shirt where the pen was snagged. It fell to the floor with an anticlimactic clatter, alongside the crushed pinecone.  
   "The messes you guys get yourselves into sometimes, I swear it's like an episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians."  
   Dean glared at Sam with a livid fury at the mention of the show, but his brother was already moving past him and Castiel towards the counter. Sam grabbed a chicken tender, then turned to Dean and shoved it into his mouth unceremoniously.  
Dean choked on it at first, but swallowed down the chicken tender after a moment of shocked chewing. "What was that for?" he asked after he could breathe once more.  
   Sam barked out a short laugh. "You're not you when you're hungry."  
   Dean shrugged his shoulders and turned back to Castiel, who stood with teary eyes, an exposed nipple, and immense confusion. "I've been a man longer than you have. I know how these things work; I'm right and you're wrong."  
   Castiel blinked his eyes rapidly and tilted his head to show exactly how befuddled he was at the moment.  
   Dean glanced at Sam, who gave him a knowing nod. He sighed. "About it being corn on the cob, dumbass!" he explained, kicking the pinecone away to prove his point. "I was right, and you were wrong. That's because I'm the _husband_ , Cas. You're the wife." 

**Author's Note:**

> im sorry. im sorry. im sorry


End file.
